The Bensalem Township School Board may weigh the options again at its monthly meeting in October.
BENSALEM TOWNSHIP, PA — Any decision on the future of the township’s middle schools will have to wait at least another month.
The Bensalem Township School Board tabled any decision on options for its middle school children in the future at its meeting on Tuesday night.
“We tabled it because the numbers weren’t accurate,” School Director Marc Cohen told Patch.
School directors were expected to weigh whether the district should build a new middle school, renovate the current ones, move sixth-graders to the middle school, or consider elementary redistricting and building consolidation.
Cohen said the school board will probably reconsider the agenda item at its October meeting.
He said the business affairs committee will review the financial figures on the middle school options once again as well.
Presentations were made on those proposals to residents last year.
Several school districts in the Philadelphia region have tackled plans recently for constructing new schools.
The Pennsbury School District is working on plans for a new high school. The Hatboro-Horsham School District just opened a new $125 million middle school, and Abington Township voters passed a special referendum during the primary election for a new middle school.
School Director Stephanie Gonzalez Ferrandez, who is running for mayor, recently outlined the options, stating that one option is to build a “mega-middle school” on a field near Robert K. Shafer Middle School and then tear the old one down.
“New is great, but that would put 1,600 11-to-14-year-olds in one building,” she said. “That’s a recipe for disaster. New also means a big price tag.”
Ferrandez also said that a new middle school would cost between $150 million and $160 million.
The school director suggested a “cost-effective solution:” Add on to Shafer and add on to the Cecelia Snyder Middle School at a price tag of $30 million less than a new middle school.
She said that would keep the student population lower and the bill for taxpayers lower as well for the upgrades.
Ferrandez said the school board had decided to move 6th graders to the middle school and that a decision to close an elementary school is pretty much off the table.